A few days ago, Samsung unveiled their latest-and-greatest flagship, the Note 9. While several news outlets and tech review websites will write pages on pages about the device, I'd like to point out the recent changes that Samsung made to the DeX software, by changing the requirements for the desktop emulation experience to just a single HDMI to USB-C adapter. My brief glances around the Internet haven't left me confident as to whether a special Samsung cable is required or not, but that's not the point - the highlight here is that on a Note 9, the only tool necessary for desktop emulation is a cable. Let's also highlight the relevant hardware specs: 8 GB of RAM, plenty (up to 512 GB!) of storage on a fast SSD, a Snapdragon 845 processor, and a more powerful cooling system that's designed to ensure better sustained thermal performance.

I'm not making predictions here. But the technology and business motivations are now present for the mobile phone that you and I carry around with us all day to start doing double-duty as a desktop.

Let's start off with the technology. I'm typing this on a Surface Book, which also has 8 GB of RAM, plenty of storage on a fast SSD, and a processor that's capable on running a full desktop operating system. Only recently did that last part become available to mobile devices. In December of 2017, Windows added support for ARM CPUs, the type that most phones use today. So theoretically, a hardware package like the Note 9 would be more than capable of running a full Windows 10 desktop experience - not just Samsung's desktop software, but full-on Windows 10. To repeat: not a desktop-lite experience, designed by Samsung that's likely unfamiliar to the average user and also limited compared to Windows and Mac OS, but the same Windows that most people know and use on a daily basis. Furthermore, the Note 9 could probably run that desktop experience well, providing users with a smooth experience, thanks to the power of the hardware.

Other important aspects of a desktop experience include sustained performance, and compatibility with various peripherals. My laptop has the hardware required to cool itself down during longer and heavier workloads, and it also has a total of 6 ports to connect to other devices. I'll grant that the fans in the Surface Book are much more powerful than those on the Note 9's, and that only 2 ports (counting the headphone jack) is limiting, but Samsung also offers the DeX Station, which expands the I/O and adds a fan to help with thermal performance.

Add in Bluetooth peripherals such as a printer, mouse, and keyboard, and I'd argue that replacing the desktops is technologically feasible - the humble home computer, not the hardcore gaming rigs, battlestations, or workstations with multiple GPUs. I'll discuss what's needed to go the distance later, but for now, consider the ramifications of that: technology has progressed sufficiently to enable a world where a phone can mimic a desktop.

What might that look like? While I haven't used DeX in person, I'd imagine it'd ideally be as simple as connecting a cable from your monitor to your phone (or, docking your phone at a station) and pressing a button on the screen to confirm that you want to start running the desktop. After that, the desktop would launch to life, and you'd be able to use all the wireless peripherals to your heart's content. Since everything is running on the same machine, all of your files - documents, photos, music, and the rest - would already be on your desktop or in your File Explorer, just where you'd expect. If you were to open up Chrome on the desktop when you had the Chrome app already open on your phone, all the Chrome tabs you had open would already be loaded and ready-to-go, and the same would apply for YouTube, Netflix, Photos, or other apps.

Later down the line, improved I/O in either the phone or the docking station could enable external GPU support or more and faster connections to other devices. For example, the current Samsung DeX station only USB 2.0 speeds, which is pretty limited. Should Intel be on board, the addition of Thunderbolt 3 could enable external hardware support, allowing performance to rival setups.

Could it ever actually happen? I'd argue that Microsoft and Samsung are both in position for this pipe dream to actually be quite possible.

Microsoft's former mobile strategy of a smartphone OS failed, and their new strategy revolves creating "experiences" in the Microsoft ecosystem regardless of device or OS. The last time I visited a Microsoft store, the phones I saw on display were the Galaxy S9 and S9+, both of which had Microsoft apps installed (not just Office, but even the launcher). Even if you prefer iOS, Microsoft wants to make sure you're using their software - Outlook instead of Mail, OneNote instead of Notes, etc. With the ability to emulate a desktop, such flexibility on the most personal of people's devices would likely increase adoption of the more powerful productivity services, and I'd imagine that Microsoft is well-positioned to benefit from such a trend. Anecdotally, while I love OneNote on my laptop, I don't have it on my phone, and I use Google Keep on the go. If I had merged those devices, I'd probably switch entirely over to OneNote, as it's more powerful and flexible.

I also think that Samsung has three key reasons they'd be willing to try such an idea out. First, Samsung is known for experimenting, especially with their mobile software. They've pioneered many new technologies (as of writing, it's rumored that they're working on a smartphone with a foldable display), and they started the larger phone segment. Samsung is a company willing to try new things out, even if they won't always work or seem a little gimmicky. Next, Samsung doesn't have a strong PC business. The company manufacturers high-volume, low-margin Chromebooks, while their higher-end PCs are relatively unheard of (at least in the US). Their Q1 financial results announcement doesn't mention the words "computer", "laptop", or "Chromebook" once. Finally, such a feature could potentially increase Samsung's pricing power on an extremely high-margin segment, driving profits, while also making the company seem more innovative (not that Samsung needs to convince people that it's innovative). Add these factors together, and you've got a company that's willing to try new stuff out, without much cannibalization risk.

I'd also argue that a company like Apple would be able to execute on such an idea just as well, though I don't know that they would - Apple would probably prefer to sell multiple high-margin devices, and improve Continuity toward the goal of providing a seamless end-user experience.

In this post, I've speculated on what might be a possibility for the future of the devices in our lives. I could be completely wrong - in fact, I'm willing to bet that I'm wrong. But it's certainly interesting to think that such a possibility is no longer hampered by technological barriers.

P.S. Just to be clear, I've never used a Samsung smartphone for any longer than 30 seconds. I certainly haven't used DeX in person, and I generally dislike Samsung's software. Because of my personal feelings, and because I feel like the average person would prefer Windows 10 to a new/limited Samsung desktop-esque experience, I focus on the ability to run Microsoft's OS.